The sixth tower hung above Evershade like a phantom, stitched from breath and storm. Its spiraling form pulsed with echoes, each beat sending waves of memory across the city.
Zephyr Vale stood beneath it, his body glowing with spirals of light. He was no longer just a listener. He was the echo.
---
The First Shift
The air trembled.
Streets bent.
Walls rippled like water.
The people gasped as their homes rearranged themselves into glyphs, symbols carved into stone and air alike. Forgotten alleys reappeared. Erased monuments rose again.
Lyra clutched her bleeding palm. "He's rewriting the city."
Nova staggered, her fractured glyph burning brighter. "No… he's repeating it. Every version of Evershade that ever existed is overlapping."
Cassian's coin fragments spun violently, orbiting him like stars. "If he keeps going, the city will collapse under its own echoes."
---
The Listener's Strain
Zephyr's voice was hoarse, trembling. "I can't stop it. The tower doesn't ask. It demands."
The stitched child stepped forward, fire flickering in rhythm with the echoes. "You are not its prisoner. You are its vessel. Vessels can choose."
Zephyr shook his head. "No. Echoes don't choose. They repeat."
Juno Blaze raised her blade, her eyes sharp. "Then we cut the repetition before it consumes you."
Cassian stepped between them. "No. If we sever him, the tower will scream. And the scream will kill us all."
---
The Loom's Warning
The sky cracked again. The Loom appeared faintly above the sixth tower, threads of fire weaving across the storm.
It pulsed once. Twice. Thrice.
The wind carried its voice:
"Echo is not memory. Echo is recursion. It does not preserve. It amplifies."
Lyra gasped. "Then every lie Aurex Vell stitched will return louder."
Nova's glyph rearranged itself into a spiral. "And every truth we uncovered will roar."
Cassian clenched his fists. "Then the world will drown in both."
---
The Fracture of Reality
The city bent further.
Streets overlapped with their past selves.
Towers doubled, tripled, flickering between centuries.
People screamed as they saw versions of themselves — younger, older, erased, forgotten.
The stitched ones glowed brighter, threads vibrating violently. They knelt before Zephyr, not in reverence, but in resonance.
Zephyr's voice cracked. "I hear everything. Every life. Every death. Every silence. It's too much."
Cassian shouted, "Then give it to me!"
Zephyr's eyes burned. "No. You are the stitcher. If you take the echo, the loop will collapse. I am the listener. I must carry it."
---
The Choice of the Echo
The stitched child raised their hand. "Then speak. Do not hold. Speak."
Zephyr gasped, clutching his chest. The wind poured into him, symbols spilling from his mouth.
Nova translated quickly, her voice trembling:
"The sixth tower does not want silence. It wants resonance. It wants the world to hear itself."
Lyra's mark pulsed violently. "Then he must speak the truth. Not the lies. Not the betrayals. Only the truth."
Cassian's coin fragments aligned. "But truth is fire. It burns."
Juno's blade gleamed. "Better fire than silence."
---
The Listener Speaks
Zephyr raised his arms, his body glowing brighter than the tower itself. The echoes surged through him, symbols weaving into a spiral above the city.
He whispered, voice trembling but resolute:
"Evershade, remember."
The spiral descended, weaving itself into the streets, the towers, the people.
Forgotten names returned. Erased songs filled the air. Betrayals screamed. Promises roared.
The city trembled.
The sixth tower pulsed.
The Loom burned.
And Zephyr Vale spoke again:
"Begin."
---
The echoes surged outward, beyond Evershade, across the land. Other cities trembled. Other towers hummed. The world itself bent under the weight of repetition.
Cassian turned to Zephyr, his voice sharp, urgent. "You've unleashed it. Do you understand what you've done?"
Zephyr's eyes glowed brighter, his voice calm, steady.
"I've given the world its voice back."
The sixth tower roared.
And the loop began to break.